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ANNEXATION OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. 



•'America is a fortunate country; she grows by the follies of European 
nations." — Napoleon Bonaparte. 



SPEECH 



HON. JOHN W. GAINES, 



OF TENNESSEE, 

IN THE 



HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 



Wednesday, June IS, 1898. 



WASHINGTON. 



1898. 
JT.1.&. 



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SPEECH 



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/>■ ^ HON. JOHN W. GAINES. 

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j The House having under consideration the joint resolution (H. Res. 259) to 

^. provide for annexing the Hawaiian Islands to the United States— 

. * Mr. GAINES said: 

a£/ Mr. Speaker: It is admitted by the champions of annexation 

that if we acquire the Hawaiian Islands we must not only increase 
our Navy to protect us as we now are, hut that we must further 
increase it to defend these islands. 

Of course, if our Navy is not already equal to the increasing 
needs of the Government, it must he made and kept so. 

What does an increased Navy mean? Does it mean reduced or 
increased taxation? If taxes must be increased, why should we cut 
off by annexation the sources of taxation? If we begin now the 
policy of colonization, will we not, as it were, climb out upon the 
end of the tariff limb and saw it off behind us? Will we not shut 
off, by annexing, the very sources of revenue that we now have 
with which to pay for an increased Navy to protect our existing 
States and Territories? 

Ah, but you say, "We will not increase the tariff." What, then, 
will you do? You will not pass an income tax. You say an in- 
come tax is held to be unconstitutional. You say we can not raise 
these increased taxes by an income tax. But you fail to even 
propose an amendment to the Constitution, and we can not retry 
the question until an income-tax law is reenacted. 

What must follow? Does it not mean that we must issue more 
bonds? What do more bonds mean? More taxation and an in- 
creased demand for gold, which will increase the fall in prices and 
further intensify the distress and penury of our people. 

Mr. Speaker, if we are to have more taxation, where is the prop- 
erty to be found to tax? You have taxed everything in sight that 
the wealth of the country would allow you to tax to carry on this 
war. 

Again, Mr. Speaker, I receive in my mail every day communi- 
cations and marked editorials saying that " we want and must 
take and hold everything in sight." 

Were we not to be satisfied with simply freeing Cuba and aiding 
the Cubans in establishing a stable form of government? Have we 
not so solemnly declared? We are not to be satisfied with this, 
but we must annex Hawaii, and go still further— take, hold, and 
govern the Philippines, Puerto Rico, the Ladrones, and the Caro- 
lines! And while we stud the seas with our new possessions, we 
must also people the ocean with grim-visaged war dogs to x^rotect 
them, and thus enter the arena where force and gunpowder are 
the controlling arguments and where war and aggression and 
entangling vexations constitute the normal condition. 

Mr. Speaker, if this policy of greed and colonization is to be 
inaugurated at this late day, then we must reverse the fixed 
2 3572 



policy of this country for over an hundred years, while our Navy 
must be so increased that it will belt the world! 

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has 
expired. 

Mr. HENRY of Mississippi. I move that the gentleman have 
five minutes longer. 

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair has no control of the 
time. Under the rule the speaker can extend his remarks. 

Mr. GAINES. Then I will not take up more of the time of the- 
House if I may be allowed to have read the excerpts which I send 
to the Clerk's desk. 

Mr. -DINSMORE. I yield that time to the gentleman. 

Mr. GAllsES. I hope the House will give this an attentive.. 
hearing. 

The Clerk read as follows: 

WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS, SEPTEMBER 17, 1795. 

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to "believe 
me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly 
[italics his] awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence 
is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. * * * 

The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extend- 
ing our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection 
as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements let them be ful- 
filled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. 

Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none or a very 
remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the 
causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, 
it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordi- 
nary vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions 
of her friendships or enmities. 

Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different 
course. If we remain one people, under an efficient iiovernment, the period 
is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; 
when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at 
anytime resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent na- 
tions, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly 
hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our 
interests, guided by justice, shall counsel. 

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own 
to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that 
of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of Euro- 
pean ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice? 

It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion 
of the foreign world. 

ANDREW JACKSON INDORSES IT. 

On March 4, 1837, Andrew Jackson, in his farewell address, in 
alluding to " Washington's Farewell Address," said: 

The lessons contained in this invaluable legacy of Washington to his coun- 
trymen should be cherished in the heart of every citizen to the latest gener- 
ation; and perhaps at no period of time could they be more usefully remem- 
bered than at the present moment; for when we look upon the scenes that are 
passing around us and dwell upon the pages of his parting address, his pater- 
nal counsels would seem to be not merely the offspring and wisdom and fore- 
sight, but the voice of prophecy, foretelling events and warning us of the 
evil to come. Forty years have passed since this imperishable document was 
given to his countrymen. 

THOMAS JEFFERSON ENUNCIATES THE DOCTRINE. 

In his first inaugural address, March 4, 1801, Jefferson said: 

Let us then with courage and confidence pursue our own Federal and Re- 
publican principles, our attachment to union and representative government. 
Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc 
of one-quarter of the globe; two high-minded to endure the degradations of 
the others; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descend- 
ants to the thousandth and thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense 
of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisition of our 
own industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not 
from birth but from our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a 
benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of 
3572 



them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; 
acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dis- 
pensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his 
greater happiness hereafter— with all these blessings, what more is necessary 
to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing more, fellow- 
citizens— a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from in- 
juring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own 
pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of 
labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this 
is necessary to close the circle of our felicities. 

THE MONROE DOCTRINE. 

President Monroe, in his seventh annual message, December 2, 
1823, said: 

We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing be- 
tween the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider 
any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hem- 
isphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or 
dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not 
interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence 
and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration 
and on just principle, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for 
the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their 
destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation 
of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States. 

Mr. Speaker, the annexation of the Hawaiian Islands means 
the abandonment of the Monroe doctrine. We notified the powers 
of the earth many years ago that they must keep their hands off 
this side of the earth and we accompanied that notice with the 
declaration that we would keep our hands off their side. The 
implied compact is universally accepted and recognized, and the 
consequence has been the gradual emancipation of Central and 
South America and the increasing expansion of liberty and free 
government. 

We have leavened the earth with the love of liberty, and now 
we are to turn our backs upon our own policy. To forsake and 
abandon the great saving policy enunciated by Mr. Monroe we 
lay our hands upon their lands, and we can not complain when 
foreign powers begin their conquests on our own hemisphere. 

The Monroe doctrine, that has protected us and kept these islands 
as they are for years, is about to be broken down. That doctrine 
has left these islands to their own ways and to make their own 
laws and customs. Have we suffered by it? 

By that doctrine we say to the whole world, and the whole world 
so understands it, that we have all the territory that we want; but 
we do not intend that any great nation shall come and establish 
itself at our gateway, and in so doing destroy these weak nations 
that are working out their own salvation without being our ene- 
mies in fact or in spirit; and if they were, would be incapable of 
doing us any injury. 

The Monroe doctrine is now the common law of nations. They 
all so understand jt. They have legislated up to this dead line in 
the ocean and stopped. They live up to it and they dare not break 
over. 

Having forced them to respect it, shall we now break it down 
ourselves? Can we longer demand of them "hands off*' when 
we begin to lay our hands upon foreign territory? 

LAW OF TREATY. 

Mr. Speaker, it is proposed to acquire these islands by a joint 
resolution, which can be passed by a simple majority of the two 
Houses, to be approved or disapproved by the President, and if 
the ] after, the resolution can be passed, and made the law of the 
land, until avoided, over the veto of the President, the sameas other 
3573 



legislation. We have never acquired any "territory " by a joint 
resolution, and we have the very highest authority holding that 
territory can not be acquired as territory and held as such by a 
joint resolution. It must be, if done legally, by conquest or treaty. 

As early as 1828 the Supreme Court, through Chief Justice 
Marshall, in 1 Peters, 540, said: 

The Constitution confers absolutely on the Government of the United 
States the powers of making war and of making treaties; consequently that 
Government possesses the power of acquiring territory either by conquest 
or by treaty. 

This court was then composed of Judges Marshall, Washington,- 
Johnson, Duval, Story, Thompson, and Trimble. This decision 
has been repeatedly reaffirmed and never doubted. 

What is a treaty? 

Black defines a treaty thus: 

In international law an agreement between two or more independent 
states— an agreement, league, or contract between two or more nations or 
sovereigns formally signed by commissioners properly authorized and sol- 
emnly ratified, etc. 

It will be thus seen by the very definition of the word treaty 
that it pertains and is confined, to negotiations with foreign pow- 
ers, whether those powers are located on this or any other con- 
tinent. 

It is known as an Executive power; that is, one to be exercised 
by the President, and are the very words of the Constitution, " by 
and with the advice and consent of the Senate." We know by 
common experience and observation that legislation as contra- 
distinguished from treaty making is enacted by the Senate, House — 
" the Congress" — with the approval of the President or over his 
veto is ex parte and confined to the limits of the United States and 
their territory. 

Chancellor Kent well says: 

The power to make treaties of peace must be coextensive with the exigen- 
cies of the nation, and necessarily involves in it that portion of the national 
sovereignty which has the exclusive direction of diplomatic negotiations and 
contracts with foreign powers. 

******* 

The department of the Government that is intrusted by the Constitution 
with the treaty-making power is competent to bind the national faith in its 
discretion, for the power to make treaties of peace must be coextensive with 
the exigencies of the nation, and necessarily involves in it that portion of the 
national sovereignty which has the exclusive direction of diplomatic nego- 
tiations and contracts with foreign powers. All treaties made by that power 
become of absolute efficacy because they are the supreme law of the land. 
There can be no doubt that the power competent to bind the nation by treaty 
may alienate the public domain and property by treaty. * * * The power 
that is intrusted generally and largely with authority to make valid treaties 
of peace can, of course, bind the nation by alienation of part of its territory. 
(1 Kent, thirteenth edition, page 166.) 

In Holden vs. Joy, in 17 Wallace, 211, Judge Clifford, in speak- 
ing for the court, said: 

Express power is given to the President, by and with the advice and con- 
sent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators 
present concur, and inasmuch as the power is given in general terms, with- 
out any description of the objects intended to be embraced within its scope, 
it must be assumed that the framers of the Constitution intended that it 
should extend to all those objects which in the intercourse of nations had 
usually been regarded as the proper subjects of negotiation and treaty, if 
not inconsistent with the nature of our Government and the relation between 
the States and the United States. 

The Constitution ordains, Article II, section 2, that — 

He [the President] shall have power, by and with the advice and consent 
of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two -thirds of the Senators present 
concur. 
3572 



6 

Note the language. "Make"— that is, create— treaties. Who? 
The President and Senate make the treaty, while the Congress— 
that is, the Senate and House of Representatives — and the Presi- 
dent, or possibly the Senate and House over the veto of the Presi- 
dent, may enforce or abrogate the treaty. 

It is significant that the treaty-making power is confined to the 
President and the Senate, while this resolution, as stated, may 
pass the House and the Senate by a simple majority, or over the 
veto of the President by the usual vote, and yet takes the place of 
a treaty and strips the President and Senate of their executive 
functions, and by a majority vote! The Constitution nowhere 
says that the President and Congress shall make treaties, or that 
the President and the House shall make treaties, or that the Senate 
and House combined may do so. It is specific and easily under- 
stood and says the President and Senate shall. 

It is a fact that the treaties heretofore proposed to annex Hawaii 
have failed to meet the approval of the Senate — in fact, have not 
received the necessary two-thirds vote. Is this the reason why the 
annexationists seek now to acquire these islands by a joint reso- 
lution, which requires, as stated, a simple majority vote? 

A recent author sums up the law of treaty, in these words: 

Congress has the power to abrogate its treaties. The treaty-making power 
is vested in the President and the Senate, and with the consent of the other 
contracting parties it is competent for the President and Senate to annul the • 
existing treaty; but the power to abrogate a treaty is vested in Congress.— 
Boutwell on the Constitution of the United States for the First Century, page 
291. 

The authorities on the subject are ably reviewed in Chan Ping 
vs. The United States (130 U. S. , 600) . J ustice Bradley, in discuss- 
ing the abrogation of our treaty with China, by which Chinese 
immigration from China was prohibited, says: 

The Constitution of the United States speaks with no uncertain sound 
upon this subject. That instrument, established by the people of the United 
States as the fundamental law of the land, has conferred upon the President 
the Executive; has made him commander in chief of the Army and Navy; 
has authorized him, by and with consent of the Senate, to make treaties, and 
to appoint ambassadors, public ministers, and consuls. As was said by this 
court in Chae Chan Ping's case (130 U. S., 600), following previous decisions: 

The treaties were no greater legal obligations than the act of Congress. 
By the Constitution, laws made in pursuance thereof and treaties made un- 
der authority of the United States are both declared to be the supreme law 
of the land, and paramount authority is not given to one over the other. A 
treaty, it is true, is in the nature of a contract between nations, and is often 
merely promissory in its character, requiring legislation to carry it into 
effect. Such legislation will be open to future repeal or amendment. If the 
treaty operates by its own force, and relates to a subject within the power 
of Congress, it can be deemed in that particular only the equivalent to a leg- 
islative act, to be repealed or modified at the pleasure of Congress. In either 
case the last expression of the sovereign must control. (149 U. S., 711,712. 
Fong Yue Ting.) 

If the President and Senate make a treaty that is not self- 
operative, Congress can enact enabling legislation. 

We have made no treaty with Hawaii, and that offered has been 
defeated by a failure of the Senate to sanction it. This measure 
is not a treaty. We have seen this House has no power to ' 'make " 
a treaty. 

It is not proposed to acquire these islands by treaty or con- 
quest. It is not contended that we have conquered these Hawaii- 
ans. It is not held that this is a treaty, but simply a joint reso- 
lution for the purpose of annexing these islands. Not having 
conquered these people, we can not take or hold this territory as 
conquerors. To conquer we must dispossess, and take not only 
3572 



physical possession of the individuals conquered, but their posses- 
sions, personal and real. 

Hence it is that by conquest the people who conquer, being then 
sovereigns, at least for the time being, acquire the possessions of 
the conquered, and in this way, even if we had no Constitution, 
but simply exercised our natural rights as human beings, we could 
thus acquire property of and from the vanquished. We say, in 
brief, that we, as a nation, acquire territory as a result of war — 
as an incident of war, some contend, but it would seem as a direct 
result and one of the means of conquering. 

But that is not this case. We are not undertaking to acquire 
these islands by conquest, but in a time of profound peace with 
this nation. ' We are therefore, and the annexationists should be, 
confined to the limitations of our written Constitution. We are 
therefore bound, under our oaths, to support this Constitution and 
to acquire these islands, if at all, according to the fundamental 
law of the land— by conquest or treaty. 

In 1870 certain jobbers or land sharks undertook to annex the 
Santo Domingo Islands by a joint resolution, but met with such 
serious opposition in and out of Congress that finally it was aban- 
doned. It was bitterly opposed, because such a means of acquisi- 
tion was unwarranted by the Constitution, by Senators Thurman, 
Sherman, Bayard, Stockton, Davis of Kentucky, Sumner, and by 
Representatives Cox of New York and Hoar of Massachusetts 
(now a distinguished Senator, who now favors the annexation of 
the Hawaiian Islands), and many others. 

Senator Thurman was for many years a most distinguished 
chief justice of the supreme court of the State of Ohio. He was 
equally illustrious as a statesman and a jurist while he adorned 
the Senate, and his great learning cast more light upon constitu- 
tional and abstruse matters, as shown by the debates in the Sen- 
ate, than any other member of that august body. In discussing 
the unconstitutionality of the annexation of the Santo Domingo 
Islands by a joint resolution, he said: 

I believe, not only with all the fathers of the Constitution but with the ex- 
pounders of it of all parties, a doctrine affirmed as strongly by Daniel Web- 
ster as it was by John 0. Calhoun, that the Government of the United States 
has no powers except such as are delegated to it by the Constitution, and that 
the absence of a delegation is just as fatal to a power as would be its express 
prohibition, and that nowhere in the Constitution is the power granted to the 
General Government to acquire territory in any other way than by treaty 
and by conquest, of course, which would follow war. You may acquire by- 
conquest as an incident to the war-making power; but in time of peace, when 
there is no war, there is no other power contained in the Constitution con- 
ferred upon the Government under which it can lawfully acquire territory 
except the treaty-making power. 

Senator Bayard, in speaking on the same point, said: 

My honorable friend from Ohio [Mr. Thurman] ably demonstrated to the 
Senate the utterly unconstitutional nature of this proposition, that Congress 
have no power by joint resolution to annex territory to the United States; 
and that even with the doubtful example of the State of Texas before us, it 
must be recollected' that in that case we are dealing with a " State," and a 
State, in the precise language of the Constitution, we are authorized to admit 
by vote of Congress. 

But who pretends, or who can pretend, that this island, peopled with a 
semibarbarous population, this chaotic mass of crime and degradation, can 
be dignified into a " State," or that from among such a people proper or de- 
cent selections can be made to take part in the government of this great 
country? No, sir; Congress has no authority, no lawful power, to annex 
foreign territory by joint resolution. By treaty stipulation alone can we be- 
come possessed of territory, an unorganized political society.— Congressional 
Globe, volume 82, page 226. 
3572 



8 

Senator Sherman said: 

You can not by joint resolution annex San Domingo as a territory; you 
must annex her as a State if you annex her by joint resolution. There is no 
clause in the Constitution that provides for the acquisition of territory by 
joint resolution, unless it be that Congress may admit new States. * * * 
No one has ever pretended that we could, by joint resolution, annex terri- 
tory as a Territory without admitting it as a State.— Congressional Globe, 
third session Forty-first Congress, pages 183, 193. 

President Grant in 1871 abandoned the plan of annexing Santo 
Domingo by treaty and recommended its annexation by joint res- 
olution, and that fell through. 

Senator Davis severely criticised the President and these meas- 
ures in the following language: 

He [the President] had not the hardihood, the audacity, to submit to the 
Congress of the United States that they should receive Dominica as a State 
into the Union. He would not so insult the understanding and the dignity 
of Congress, tbe understanding. and the rights of the American people, as to 
make any such monstrous proposition. Still there is a general vague and 
covert proposition that Dominica shall be received into the Union by joint 
resolution of Congress, and as he in effect repudiates and does not give any 
countenance to the idea of its admission by joint resolution as a State into 
the Union, what is the effect and purpose of the President's elaborate con- 
sideration and dissertation upon the subject in his message? 

Simply that Congress shall advance beyond the principle and the provision 
of the Constitution, beyond all the precedents, and admit Dominica, not as a 
State into the Union, but as a Territory, whose inhabitants are incompetent 
to take upon themselves the duties and responsibilities of citizens of the 
United States in the business of self-government in adopting a constitution 
and acting the part of a State in the Union. 

That is the purpose of the President; that is his recommendation; that is 
his proposition. It is in furtherance of that proposition, as I understand, 
that this joint resolution has been introduced. It is simply to take up this 
furtive, unconstitutional project of the President, to be effected without au- 
thority of the Constitution, and perverting and usurping its powers by Con- 
gress assuming the prerogative of the treaty -making power in admitting into 
-the Union as a Territory territory that now forms part of a foreign country. 
It is to forward and give impetus, strength, and power to this covert and 
monstrous proposition that this resolution is introduced. 

Mr. Wood, of New York, in the House, on the same subject, 
said: 

Therefore I concur in these views and contend that if Dominica is to be 
annexed to the United States as a Territory it must be by a treaty made 
with the Dominican Government, which is a foreign power. It is impossible, 
constitutionally, to bring Dominica into the Uniou as a Territory by joint 
resolution, as is proposed. I have other authorities upon this subject. I 
have the opinion of some of the ablest expounders of constitutional law now 
living directly to that point, but I have not time nor will I detain the House 
to refer to them. 

I say, therefore, again, if Dominica is to be acquired at all, except by treaty, 
she must come in as a State, with all the rights and privileges of other States. 
To this there are grave objections, to which I will refer hereafter. 

The contention was, then, that if foreign territory could be ac- 
quired at all, it must be done by the treaty-making power — the 
President and Senate— and that Congress could not by legisla- 
tion do so. That while "new States" might be admitted into the 
Union by the House of Representatives and Senate, even over the 
veto of the President, yet they were without power to annex ter- 
ritory as territory by simple legislation. 

Let us see just how we have procured our various acquisitions 
since the formation of our Constitution: 

1. Louisiana was annexed in 1803 by purchase, consummated 
in advance, and ratified by treaty. 

2. Florida, in 1819, by treaty. Texas was never annexed, but 
was admitted into the Union as a State in 1845. 

3. New Mexico and California were acquired by conquest and 
treaty. 

4. The Gadsden purchase by treaty in 1853. 
3572 



9 

5. Alaska was acquired by treaty in 1867. 

The annexationists cite in support of this unprecedented meas- 
ure the admission of Texas into the Union by joint resolution as 
authority for annexing this territory as territory, to be held as 
territory, by a joint resolution. The two cases are not parallel. 

She was admitted under that explicit provision of the Constitu- 
tion which ordains that 

"New States maybe admitted by Congress into this Union," 
not "annexed," but "admitted" by the Congress into "this 
Union." 

First. Texas was a free and independent State before we ad- 
mitted her. The United States, as early as 1837, recognized her 
independence as a free State; England, Belgium, and France soon 
thereafter. 

Second. She had her own State government — President, Sam 
Houston, of Tennessee— and her Congress. 

Third. She made her own laws, and was peopled principally by 
emigrants from the United States. 

Fourth. She was admitted not as, or to be, a " Territory," but im- 
mediately as, and because she was already, a " State." 

Fifth, The treaty-making power can not admit a State as a State; 
Congress can. 

Sixth. Texas was formerly a part of the United States and until 
1819, when by treaty we ceded her to Spain. 

Seventh. Texas is contiguous territory. 

Senator Thurman, in discussing the Santo Domingo resolution 
gave the reasons why Texas was admitted as a State by a joint 
resolution. He said: 

Now, the first thing that strikes me is this: Is the Senate ready to recede 
from its position? Is the Senate ready to ratify a treaty for the annexation 
of Dominica, or is the Senate ready to annex Dominica by joint resolution? 
And in that connection 1 beg leave to call the attention of the Senate to the 
fact that you can not by joint resolution annex Dominica as a Territory; you 
must annex her as a State if you annex her by joint resolution. There is no 
clause in the Constitution of the United States that provides for the acquisi- 
tion of territory by joint resolution of Congress, unless it be one single pro- 
vision, and that is that the Congress may admit new States into the Union. 

And it was upon the argument that there was no limitation upon that 
power to admit new States into the Union that it was not limited to terri- 
tory belonging to the United States, but that territory belonging to a for- 
eign power might be admitted into the Union as a State. It was upon that 
doctrine that the resolution in the case of Texas was passed. But no one has 
ever pretended that you could by joint resolution annex territory as a Ter- 
ritory without admitting it as a State. 

It will be interesting here to briefly give the history of Texas 
up to her admission as a State of this Union: 

Previous to 1819 the United States had claimed as part of the Louisiana 
purchase the region known as Texas as far as the Rio Grande River, but by 
the Spanish treaty of that year yielded its claim. Soon afterwards inhab- 
itants of the United States b^gan to remove to Texas, where they obtained 
grants of land and settled. It thus grew into a State which was closely allied 
to the United States. 

In 1827 and 1829 Clay and Calhoun, as Secretaries of State, tried to obtain, 
but without success, Texas by purchase, offering §1,000,000 and $5,000,0U0. In 
March, 1836, Texas, dissatisfied with the Government of Mexico, declared its 
independence. A short war followed. The Mexicans committed massacres 
at Goliad and the Alamo, but on April 10, at the San Jacinto, Santo Anna, 
the Mexican President, with 5,000 men, was badly defeated by 700 men under 
Gen. Sam Houston, the commander of the Texan forces. • 

Santa Anna agreed to a treaty which recognized the independence of 
Texas. This was not ratified by Mexico, but in March, 1837, the United States 
recognized the independence of the Republic of Texas, and soon England, 
France, and Belgium did likewise. In 1837 Texas made application to Con- 
gress for annexation, but with no immediate result. The Presidential cam- 
paign of 18-14 turned largely on this question. The Democratic convention 
3572 



10 

nominated Polk, who favored annexation, instead of Van Buren, who op- 
posed it. Clay, tne "Whig candidate, was also sxrpposed to be against the 
project. In the meantime Calhoun, Secretary of State, had negotiated a 
treaty of annexation with Texas in April, 184:4, including the territory be- 
tween Nueces and Rio Grande rivers, disputes as to which finally led to the 
Mexican war. 

This treaty failed of ratification at the hands of the Senate. Polk was 
elected , but his election was taken as a sign of popular approval of annexation, 
and Congress and Tyler's Administration now became attached to the proj- 
ect. Early in 1845 Congress authorized the President to negotiate a treaty 
of annexation. Tyler hastened to accomplish the object, though without a 
treaty, and on the last day of his term sent a special messenger to Texas. 
This emissary on June 18 secured the consent of the congress of Texas, 
which was ratified by popular vote on July 4. A resolution for the admis- 
sion of Texas as a State was passed in the House of Representatives by a 
vote of 141 to 50 on December 16, 1845. and in the Senate by a vote of 31 to 13 
on December 22, and Texas was declared a State of the Union December 29, 
1845. 

Mr. Johnson, of Tennessee, afterwards President, in the House, 
1845, said: 

The admission of a sovereign State into the Union is not an acquisition of 
territory in the sense that territory is or can be acquired under the treaty- 
making power. They are wholly different. * * * 

Bear in mind that we are annexing these islands as territory, 
and not as, or to be, a " new State" of this Union. 
Mr. Colquitt, of Georgia, a Senator, said: 

Honorable Senators seem to blend the idea of acquiring territory and ad- 
mitting States and thereby produce confusion. It is insisted that we must 
acquire territory by treaty. Let this be so, and it does not touch the argu- 
ment. For it is absolutely certain that you can not admit a State into the 
Union by treaty, that power being conferred alone upon Congress. 

And again said: 

The argument I have just made is based upon the supposition that by ad- 
mitting Texas as a State this Government acquires the territory of Texas. 
I have thought proper to enforce this view because it seems impossible for 
some minds'to conceive how Texas can become a member of the Union unless 
this Government does thereby acquire her territory. To my mind the dis- 
tinction is manifest, and that by the resolutions from the House we acquire 
no territory, but leave Texas as a State, possessed of her entire domain, to 
dispose of as she pleases, under our Constitution, fixing only the terms by 
which she may become a confederate. The acquisition of territory is one 
thing; the admission of a State is another and totally different. 

Mr. Van Buren, in a letter to Mr. Hamrnett, said: 

The Executive and Senate may, as I have already observed, by the exer- 
cise of the treaty-making power, acquire territory; but new States can only 
be admitted by Congress; and the sole authority over the subject, which is 
given to it by the Constitution, is contained in the following provision, viz: 
"New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union.*' The only 
restrictions imposed upon this general power are, first, that no new States 
shall be formed within the jurisdiction of any other State; nor, secondly, 
"any State formed by the junction of two or more States or parts of States 
without the consent of the legislatures concerned, as well as of Congress" — 
restrictions which have no bearing upon the present question. 

The matter therefore stands as it would do if the Constitution said, "New 
States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union," without addition 
or restriction. That these words, taken by themselves, are broad enough to 
authorize the admission of the Territory of Texas, can not, I think, be well 
doubted; nor do I perceive upon what principle we can set up limitations to 
a power so unqualifiedly recognized by the Constitution in the plain, simple 
words I have quoted, and with which no other provision of that instrument 
conflicts in the slightest degree. 

Although Texas was already a free and independent State, for- 
merly a part of the United States, peopled by emigrants from the 
United States, with perfect governmental machinery patterned 
after our own, with Samuel Houston (once govern or of Tennessee) 
as President, and a Congress elected by her people; and although 
immediately adjoining the United States and naturally a part of 
this continent, Senator Choate contended that Congress could not 

375.' 



11 

admit her as a State of this Union, though the Constitution ex- 
pressly gives Congress the power to admit new States, He said: 

It was not until it was found that the treaty of last session had no chance 
of passing the Senate, no human being, save one, no man, woman, or child in 
this Union or out of the Union, wise or foolish, drunk or sober, was ever 
heard to breathe one syllable about this power in the Constitution of admit- 
ting new States being applicable to the admission of foreign nations (Texas 
being an independent foreign nation), governments, or states. With one 
exception, till ten months ago, no such doctrine was ever heard of or even en- 
tertained. He insisted that the joint resolution was gotten np "not from 
any well-founded faith in its orthodoxy, but for the mere purpose of carry- 
ing a measure by a bare majority of Congress that could not be carried by a 
two-thirds majority of the Senate in accordance with the treaty-making 
power."— Congressional Globe, second session Twenty-eighth Congress, page 

m. 

When we have acquired territory by the treaty-making power, 
it has been with the distinct understanding expressly stated that 
such territory would be given a Territorial government until it 
became sufficiently inhabited to be admitted into full statehood 
with the old States. In this way many of our States, and partic- 
ularly in the Southwest and West, have gone from Territory into 
full statehood. But there is no provision in this resolution to 
admit these islands as a State into this Union now or hereafter. 
On the contrary, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hitt], the 
chairman of the committee reporting this bill, when asked by my 
neighbor, the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Clardy] , this ques- 
tion— 

; Suppose these islands are received into the United States under this reso- 
lution, what does this Administration intend, or what do the people of the 
3 United States intend, to do with them? Will they be admitted as a State? 
.•It seems to me that is a very important question- 
Here is his remarkable answer: 

Mr. Hitt. I am not a mind reader, and the Almighty alone can answer 
what is in men's minds. * * * The gentleman will have to find that out 
from other sources. * * * By the terms of this resolution all such ques- 
tions will be determined by Congress.— Congressional Record, volume 31, 
page 6770. 

"By Congress," you see. when we have already seen that Con- 
gress is only given the right to admit "new States." The next 
step, the gentleman [Mr. Hitt] suggests, will be to admit as a 
State these islands, stricken with leprosy since 1856, with 1,400 
lepers already there, and her conglomerate population — Japanese, 
25,400; Chinese, 21,616 (which we have excluded from this coun- 
try); Portuguese, 15,291; British, 2,250; Germans, 1,432; Hawaiians 
(pure and mixed), 39,504; Americans, 3,031 (who are really run- 
ning the whole thing and forcing this movement), making a total 
of 109,000 people. 

This is the mass, the refuse of all creation, that will soon be 
knocking at the doors of Congress for statehood, that two Sena- 
tors, leprous suspects, and two Representatives, leprous suspects, 
may be elected and sit in Congress to make laws for this country 
and that unfortunate people. With such prospects, with such a 
future as this, we are not surprised that the distinguished gentle- 
man from Ohio [Mr. Grosvenor], a zealous annexationist, 
squirmed around the question when asked what we would do with 
this country when she is annexed, and said: 

I scorn to discuss what is to come from this annexation. 

But as the heat of debate increased the annexationists became 

bolder, and the noblest Roman of them all frankly stated that we 

would do as England does. That he preferred to take advice 

of her and other foreign nations than to be guided by our past 

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12 

history or advised from his own people. I allude to the distin- 
guished gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Hepburn], who says: 

And while I listen to gentlemen who are full of forebodings, while I have 
great respect for their learning, yet I have more respect for the statesman- 
ship of England, of Germany, of Russia, of France— nations that are to-day 
pursuing successfully and to our detriment the colonial system that gentle- 
men here tell us is to be ruinous to us if we follow their example. The states- 
manship of the earth to-day is in favor of this system of colonization, of ter- 
ritorial expansion, of breadth and greatness and grandeur, of extension of 
empires. All the statesmanship of the world, save that of the Democratic 
party here in the United States, says lt aye " to the proposition; they alone are 
halting in the procession. [Laughter.]— Congressional Record, volume 31, 
page 6662. 

The sentiment here expressed is amazing when its meaning is 
measured by the only experience this country has had. We were 
once in the very relation with respect to England that is sought 
to be established for Hawaii. We were once a colonial depend- 
ency of England and a victim of the glorious policy the gentle- 
man so lauds, and what was our fate? Go read the scathing 
array of abuses embodied in the Declaration of Independence, the 
long series of oppressions and wrongs set out in that withering 
indictment of King George, and then bow your head with shame 
that such audacious sentiment as that uttered by the gentleman 
can find expression in the American Congress. It is in keeping 
with that other policy of the Republican party which sees no good 
in home-made financial policies and must look to England for ex- 
ample and sit at the feet of English statesmen for the only financial 
wisdom. God save America from ever having such an indictment 
found against her, and God save this people from being dragged 
into a condition where such shameful thing may be possible. 

The Republicans laugh,_the annexationists smile, when the 
teachings of Washington, Jefferson, Monroe, Jackson, Webster, 
and the policy and principles of our Government for over one 
hundred years are thus smote and condemned by the mouthpiece 
of the Administration, whose backs, we see, are turned upon this 
Government, and the statesmanship of England, Germany, Rus- 
sia, and France is pointed to as the beacon lights for our future as 
a nation. I ask, Mr. Speaker, is it not time to — 

Throw out the life line- 
There is danger ahead. 

YUCATAN WAS DENIED ADMISSION. 

In 1848 Yucatan knocked at the door of the Union and sought 
admittance. Worn out with internecine strife, its commissioners 
came to President Polk praying for protection from the Indians, 
and offered to transfer "the dominion and sovereignty of the 
peninsular " to this Government. Mr. Polk, in a message dated 
April 29, 1848, submitted the facts to Congress and said: 

In this condition they have, through their constituted authorities, implored 
the aid of this Government to save them from destruction, offering in case 
this should be granted, to transfer the "dominion and sovereignty of the 
peninsular " to the United States. Similar appeals for aid and protection have 
been made to the Spanish and English Governments. Whilst it is not my 
purpose to recommend the adoption of any measure with a view to the ac- 
quisition of the " dominion and sovereignty " over Yucatan, yet, according to 
our established policy, we could not consent to a transfer of this " dominion 
and sovereignty" either to Spain, Great Britain, or any other Euiopean 
power. 

He then quoted, reaffirmed, and applied the Monroe doctrine. 
Here is an exact precedent, almost identically analogous, differing 
only in that it had the advantage over the case now being consid- 
ered in not being foreign territory, but lying within this hemis- 
phere and almost immediate vicinity, and yet Congress refrained 
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13 

from accepting the transfer of the dominion, and the President 
specifically declined to recommend it. The Constitution afforded 
no such power, and no one ever dreamed that it did. 

Mr. Jefferson, in a letter to W. C. Nicholas, September 7, 1803, 
said: 

But when I consider that the limits of the United States are precisely 
fixed by the treaty of 1783, that the Constitution expressly declares itself to 
be made for the United States. I can not help believing that the intention was 
not to permit Congress to admit into the Union new States which should be 
formed out of the territory for which, and under whose authority alone, 
they were acting. 

I do not believe it was meant that they might receive England, Ireland, 
Holland, etc., into it, which would be the case upon your construction. When 
an instrument admits two constructions— the one safe, the other dangerous; 
the one precise, the other indefinite— I prefer that which is safe and precise. 
I had rather ask an enlargement of power from the nation when it is found 
necessary than to assume it by a construction which would make our powers 
boundless. Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written constitu- 
tion. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction. 

I say the same as to the opinion of those who make the grant of the treaty- 
making power boundless. If it is, then we have no Constitution. If it has 
bounds, they can be no others than the definitions of the powers which the 
instrument gives. It specifies and delineates the operations permitted to 
the Federal Government, and gives all the powers necessary to carry those 
into execution. Whatever of these enumerated objects is proper for a law. 
Congress may make the law; whatever is proper to be executed by way of 
treaty, the President and Senate may enter into that treaty; whatever is to 
be done by a judicial sentence, the judges may pass that sentence. 

We see that in addition to the prospect now of having Hawaii 
as a State, the process of colonization is just begun, and soon 
other such countries are to be annexed and later admitted as States 
of this Union. Are we ready for this? Was it ever intended that 
we should be ready? Mr. Speaker, can we ever be ready to sub- 
mit to such a calamity? Not content with illegally annexing ter- 
ritory — the foreign territory of one people — this movement of im- 
perialism is now inaugurated and to be perpetuated. 

Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Quincy, Mr. Webster. Chief Justice Taney, 
and others denied the power of the United States to acquire for- 
eign adjoining territory even by treaty and for the immediate 
purpose of making new States of the territory thus acquired. But 
here islands throughout the world are to be acquired and to be held 
as territory, as colonies, and that, too, not by treaty, as the Consti- 
tution, if at all, permits, but by the simple legislation of Congress. 

Mr. Speaker, it is plain, by the very words of the Constitution 
and as expressly intended by the framers, that out of portions 
of the old States Congress had the right to make new States, 
which has been done. For example: Maine, Vermont, and New 
Hampshire were portions of old Massachusetts, West Virginia of 
Virginia, Tenneseee of North Carolina, while the Western States 
east of the Mississippi were formed of portions of that territory 
ceded to the United States by the old States, acquiring it, as the 
people then contended and courts held, as a result of the Revolu- 
tionary war. 

It was surrendered, ceded by the old States, to pay off our then 
war debt and to make into new States to be admitted into the 
Union, "the States when united." This cession settled a contro- 
versy between the States that this vacant territory was territory 
bought by the people by the blood they spilled in gaining our 
independence. 

It was doubted that the United States had the right or power to 
acquire by treaty or otherwise than by conquest, of course, addi- 
tional territory for the purpose of adding new States to the United 
States. But to prevent war Jefferson yielded, on the condition 
3572 



14 

that the Constitution be thereafter amended, and urged the pur- 
chase by treaty of Louisiana and other territory in that section, 
that our people might have free access to the Mississippi River. 

Our citizens' use of that river and our right of "deposit" in 
that section was invaded and "withdrawn." Their commerce on 
that river was broken up. This our people, Mr. Jefferson said, 
would not stand longer. Louisiana, and the right to navigate the 
Mississippi River— a natural right, he contended— must be ac- 
quired or war was inevitable. Jefferson yielded, and by treaty 
Louisiana was acquired to relieve this situation, not by joint res- 
olution, but by treaty, and for the further purpose of making 
"new States," which was done. Mr. Jefferson was not alone in 
believing that the right of the United States to acquire new States 
was limited to its original confines. 

Mr. Chief Justice Taney, in. the celebrated Dred Scott case, 
used this language: 

There is certainly no power given by the Constitution to the Federal Gov- 
ernment to establish or maintain colonies bordering on the United States or 
at a distance, to be ruled and governed at its own pleasure, nor to enlarge 
its territorial limits in any way except by the admission of new States. 
That power is plainly given; and if anew State is admitted it needs no fur- 
ther legislation by Congress, because the Constitution itself defines the rela- 
tive powers and duties of rhe State and citizens of the State and the Federal 
Government. But no power is given to acquire territory to be held and gov- 
erned permanently in that character. 

Mr. Webster, in a speech delivered at Buffalo, N. Y., May 22, 
1851, said: 

It was inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States, or thought 
to be so, in Mr. Jefferson's time, to attach Louisiana to the United States. 
* * * My opinion remains unchanged that it was not within the original 
scope or design of the Constitution to admit new States out of foreign terri- 
tory. 

March 15, 1837, he said again: 

I say, then, gentlemen, in all frankness, that I see objections, I think insur- 
mountable objections, to the annexation of Texas to the United States. When 
the Constitution was formed, it is not probable that either its framers or the 
people ever looked to the admission of any State into the Union except such 
as then already existed and such as should be formed out of territories then 
already belonging to the United States. 

Senator Morgan, in a letter addressed to Mr. James K. Kaulie 
and published in the Honolulu Independent of October 19, says: 

Nor could we in any event accept Hawaii as a dependency or colony. We 
have no such powers under our Constitution. 

It is no answer now to this palpably correct view to say that 
this distinguished gentleman has changed his opinion. 

Now, then, in the face of these learned opinions and our past 
history, the annexationists insist that we have the power, by a joint 
resolution, to annex this foreign territory as territory and hold it 
as territory, no provision whatever being made for its admission 
as a State now or at any other time. Judge Taney said: 

The different departments of the Government have recognized the right 
of the United States to acquire territory which at the time it is intended to 
admit as a new State into the Union. 

It was doubted if Congress had the power to admit Texas, a 
State free and independent before her admission, when Congress 
had the express right to admit new States, and now by "implica- 
tion" it is contended that Congress has the power to annex this 
territory, confessedly not a State, but a territory 2,100 miles from 
the borders of California. 

Here is an act about to be done without a precedent in the his- 



15 

tory of our country, upon a power implied from the grant expressly 
given to admit new States. The rule is old and well-settled, that — 

The United States can claim no powers which are not granted to it by the 
Constitution, and the powers actually granted must be such as are expressly 
given, or given by necessary implication. (1 Wheaton, 326.) 

This rule was enunciated by Chief Justice Marshall at an early 
day in our history, but it is now too old, it is claimed, to be any 
longer the law of this land, and is being ignored here to-day by 
the friends of this measure. 

"What is the Constitution between friends?" Let those who 
have taken the solemn oath to uphold and enforce it answer. 
Let those who would spit upon the Constitution, upon the tra- 
ditions of this country for over a hundred years, ask this ques- 
tion and laugh as they do it. As for me, I shall stand by the 
oath I have taken to support this sacred instrument. May I be 
false first to my own self, if false I must be to anyone, but last 
always to my country and to the patriotic people whose trust I 
hold in my hand and whom I have the honor in part to represent 
in this House. 

But as step by step the annexationists lose their foothold they 
catch as a drowning man at straws and find, they think, a harbor 
in the boundless " welfare clause " in the Constitution, and say that 
the public welfare requires the annexation of these islands. 

If they would say the private welfare of a handful of American 
sugar and coffee growers who live there and who are prowling 
around the precincts of this Capitol logrolling for this measure, 
the truth might te fully told. 

Only a few days ago, in a conversation with a high public official, 
I was asked my views on this subject, which I gave. I found 
him an ardent annexationist. He said " we " need these islands 
as a war support." As I turned to leave him he drew from his 
desk some large photographs and said, "I own a coffee farm down 
there, and here are photographs of it," exhibiting them. 

On another occasion a resident of Washington, after a long con- 
versation on the subject of annexation, as we parted, said, "Of 
course 1 am for annexation. It will make my land there worth 
$50 per acre, but I don't blame you as a member of Congress for 
opposing annexation. I would, too, situated differently." 

Doubtless this is but a bird's-eye view of similar experiences of 
other members with these patriots. 

That we have the power to annex these islands under the 
general- welfare clause is an unheard-of proposition. If it be true 
that we have such power, then why was the treaty-making power 
confined exclusively to the President and the Senate? Or why 
did the other provision of the Constitution grant to Congress the 
power to admit ''new States?" 

Why could not all of this have been done under the general- 
welfare clause without these provisions? If these acquisitions can 
be made under that clause, why were the other clauses inserted at 
all, and, if inserted, why with such specific limitations? All the 
adjudications of the Supreme Court of the United States and the 
past history of this country are witnesses against the position 
taken here by the friends of this measure. 

If this clause admits of this construction, or if it was thus in- 
tended by the framers of the Constitution, pray tell me why this 
wise council of men, in lieu of all other clauses, failed to declare 
"that the Congress shall have power to enact any legislation the 
public welfare requires? " This would have saved them much time 
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jrgRARY OF CONGRESS 

019 944 332 A 



16 

and labor and succeeding generations oceans of contentions and 
seas of lawsuits. 

It is true as charged that the Democratic party has always led 
in extending the domain and the power and glory of this Govern- 
ment; but it is equally true that in every such movement the ways 
pointed out by the Constitution were rigidly followed. Gentle- 
men affect to deride that party and charge it with lagging in this 
latter-day colony-grabbing mania that has seized upon the Gov- 
ernments of Europe. They call that mania " statesmanship " and 
" wise diplomacy," and they hoot at and decry the safe and stable 
policies that have animated American statesmen; and that have 
proved efficacious in building up a Government that leads all 
others in the benefits it bestows upon its people and upon human- 
ity. The Democratic party glories in its record of territorial ac- 
quisition. It glories in the fact that every foot of land we have 
gained came through its instrumentalities. It glories in the fact 
that every acquisition it has made has proven wise and good, and 
has served to extend the blessings of free government and lead to 
greater happiness and prosperity. It glories chiefly in the fact 
that in every instance it has tracked the way blazed out by the 
Constitution, and it glories now in that it is able to withstand the 
glittering allurements held out and stand by that sacred instru- 
ment. 

The Democratic party has held to the plain letter and meaning 
of the Constitution and has been foremost in acquiring territory 
out of which States might be made. By no imaginary stretch can 
the power be extorted which permits the acquisition of foreign 
territory. It is as clear as noonday that that instrument contem- 
plates the acquisition of such territory only as States may be made 
of — contiguous territory with identical interests and associations, 
capable of being absorbed into one homologous whole, and all the 
wise men who helped to build our institutions have all so held. 
If we are to fall now into this procession of powers marching on 
to the savage realms of the East and seek a part in the entangle- 
ments and strifes that will constitute its chief heritage; if we are 
to be allured from the old, safe, glorious landmarks by dreams of 
conquest and follow this new idea born in European greed, then 
our Constitution must either be amended or violated. As for my- 
self, I prefer to remember my oath to uphold it. 

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